Three Taleban mullahs condemned a pregnant widow to be flogged and shot in public, in a remote part of western Afghanistan on Sunday, after convicting her of having an affair.

Mullah Daoud, a senior Taleban commander contacted by this newspaper, said that he had sat on the panel of three judges which reached the decision, in an area of Badghis province firmly under militant control.

“There were three mullahs that passed this verdict. I was one of them,” he said. “We gave this decision so that in future no one should have these illegal affairs. We whipped her in front of all the local people, to show them an example. Then we shot her.”

I think that's why pulp heroes like The Shadow were so popular in the 1930s. It was an era when, as now, it was sometimes hard to tell who the bad guys were, and in the real world prudent people hold back from extreme measures for fear of mistakenly punishing an innocent - but The Shadow always knew.